CORRECTED - Spanish police arrest 'Anonymous' PlayStation attackers

(Corrects headline to attackers instead of hackers and
throughout story to show that allegations are of cyber attacks,
not hacking, and that they were against Sony PlayStation store,
not Sony PlayStation network; corrects spelling of Libya in
paragraph 4; corrects Reuters instrument code for Sony in first
paragraph
)

MADRID, June 10 (Reuters) - Spanish police arrested three
suspected members of the so-called "Anonymous" group on Friday
on charges of cyber attacks against targets including Sony's
(6758.T) PlayStation store, governments, businesses and banks.

The police said the accused, arrested in Almeria,
Barcelona and Alicante, were guilty of coordinated computer
attacks from a server set up in a house in Gijon in the
north of Spain.

Spanish police alleged the three arrested "hacktivists" had
been involved in cyber attacks on Spanish banks BBVA (BBVA.MC)
and Bankia and the Italian energy group Enel (ENEI.MI) as well
as Sony PlayStation stores.

Members of the loosely coordinated "Anonymous" group,
known for wearing Guy Fawkes masks made popular by the
graphic novel "V for Vendetta," had also attacked government
sites in Egypt, Algeria, Libya, Iran, Chile, Colombia and New
Zealand, police said.

"They are structured in independent cells and make
thousands of simultaneous attacks using infected 'zombie'
computers worldwide. This is why NATO considers them a
threat to the military alliance," the police said in a
statement.

"They are even capable of collapsing a country's
administrative structure."

The arrests are the first in Spain against members of
the "Anonymous" group following similar legal proceedings in
the United States and Britain.

The police did not rule out further arrests.
(Reporting by Iciar Reinlein, Writing by Paul Day; Editing by
Mike Nesbit)